Former vice president, El Salvador (1999-2004)

Carlos Quintanilla Schmidt

Carlos Quintanilla Schmidt was vice president of El Salvador from 1999 to 2004. Under President Francisco Flores, he supported “dollarization,” the introduction of the U.S. dollar as the country’s official currency.

In the data

Quintanilla Schmidt is a director and a board member of Fusades Ltd., which was incorporated as a charitable organization in Bermuda in 2008. María Eugenia Brizuela de Ávila, who stepped down as Salvadoran foreign minister in 2003, later was a Fusades director from 2009 to 2011.

The company – which is owned by Fusades International Trust – has an investment portfolio, and its purpose is “to support initiatives and projects whose goals are to promote the socio-economic and intellectual progress and public health of the inhabitants of El Salvador through sustainable development within a system of democracy and individual liberties,” as stated in a 2012 memo.

According to an October 2010 email – one of several marked “CONFIDENTIAL” and exchanged before a visit by the company’s board to Appleby’s Bermuda offices – the intention was "to use the income from the investments to fund” the Fusades Foundation, a conservative think tank.The acronym Fusades in Spanish stands for the Salvadoran Foundation for Social and Economic Development.

In one of the emails, an Appleby employee also noted that financial statements for “the Trust and the Company were consolidated – which we do not believe is appropriate.” According to the latest Fusades financial records in the Appleby database, the market value of the Fusades portfolio in 2014 was $996,788.65 and $250,000 was withdrawn that August.“

In recent years, the Fusades Foundation and the conservative La Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (ARENA) party have supported anti-corruption campaigns, the Salvadoran press has reported.

Quintanilla Schmidt, identified as a Politically Exposed Person in Appleby’s database, is also a lawyer and Appleby’s contact person for Toruno-Steiner Ltd., an investment holding in Bermuda. Its shareholders, Oscar Rene Toruno and Jutta Steiner de Toruno, a prominent Salvadoran business executive and his wife, are listed as “joint tenants.”

Response

Quintanilla Schmidt said Fusades Ltd.’s purpose is to support Fusades Foundation, and its proceeds are donated to the foundation as matching funds for grants and funding for its various programs. The company’s endowment is in strict observance of all legal and tax regulations, Quintanilla Schmidt wrote in an emailed statement to ICIJ.

He didn’t respond to questions about his role in Toruno-Steiner or its business purpose.

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